Oh Battlestar, where are you going?

by Ed on January 28, 2006

I must confess I’m a bit dismayed at the way Battlestar Galactica has been the past 2 episodes. They just didn’t fly with me much at all, especially this last one. I’m warning you now that if you are not caught up, don’t read any more.

The previous episode where Roslin is about to die and is saved at the last minute was really good, up until the point where Baltar reads the letter and gets angry because Roslin tells him he needs people skills. Angry to the point of handing a nuke over to the corporeal 6. I’m sorry, but that stretches plausibility to the breaking point in my mind. I know he thinks he’s great and all, but at least from past indications he seems like he’d generally agree with everything the president had written. He’s just being weird. And a different weird than what made him so interesting before.

And this latest episode about Apollo seems to have come from left field. I mean, what the hell was that all about. Maybe it will be clear in a future episode? I dunno. But Apollo all of a sudden has decided he doesn’t like living as of Resurrection Ship part 2? When he first said he wished they hadn’t gotten there in time, I figured maybe he had become disillusioned by his father and the president’s decision to off Admiral Kane. But now I don’t know what his problem is.

Any why the heck would Dee even be all ‘is this going anywhere’. I mean, I remember the ep where she and Apollo are fighting and there’s a moment. The moment was an interesting thing, but this conversation in this recent episode just seemed too overt and quite frankly pointless.

I’m also kinda miffed that they offed the new Pegasus commander so quickly. I liked his character a lot and I thought he’d be one of those are-they-really-friendly-or-not people that might add an interesting dynamic. I clearly need to listen to the podcasts for these shows to find out what the heck they were thinking.

I dunno. I mean, despite the general plot differences, both this and the old series saw Kobol and found Pegasus. But the Pegasus was lost in the original and Commander Adama was still Commander Adama. Well, I guess there was no president in the original to promote him, but still, it seems now that they’ve decided that they payed enough homage to the original and now they’re off in some new direction. I’m going to wait and see how it goes. I hope it’s good. It better be, as up until these last wacky turns, this was by far the best show probably on TV as a whole. Amazing acting and crazy plot twists that gave shows like 24 a run for their money. Don’t mess it up!

PS: I am listening to the podcasts now, and apparently Ron Moore didn’t really like the last episode much either.

So you’re telling me you weren’t bothered by the last minute saving of the president by blood form the Cylon baby? That’s where it instantly went south for me. The fact that she was not only saved, but did an instant turn-around after such a long decline was worthy of a Voyager episode. Baltar has always seemed a little over the top, so the handing over of the nuke didn’t surprise me. His Cylon love interest is, after all, the head of the group he gave it to. The Apollo plot arc is a weird one too, as is the weird infatuation-from-nowhere by Dee.

Who knows… we’ll see where this goes over the next few weeks. They haven’t introduced time travel in yet, so I’m still with ’em.

I was bothered a bit with the last minute saving, but I knew something had to happen. I didn’t think for a minute they’d kill her off.

Listening to the podcast at least made me feel better about this last episode since Ron Moore didn’t like it and he went through the whole episode telling why and I agreed with him on every point: too flat, not really a BSG feel. Too typical of a plot and not engaging at all. He felt awful about it.

But he did say that the next episode would be back to the BSG you expect and they really like it. He also indicated something about how this season ends… not specifics, but enough to make me go ‘oh no!’ in a good way.

I’m with you. The show is getting less fun. For me it was the last minute saving of the president bit that did it. It’s feeling more like a soap opera about the main characters. They used to have multiple plot lines with lots of characters (with the stuff back on the home planet) and the fun religious cylon weirdness. Now we hardly get to see the cylons. Tonight better be better.